


Them Gunners Are At It Again

by shepardly



Series: Nate 'n MacCready [5]
Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout 4
Genre: Established Relationship, Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-15
Updated: 2017-12-16
Packaged: 2019-02-14 22:13:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 12,282
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13017225
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shepardly/pseuds/shepardly
Summary: MacCready holds down the fort at Sanctuary while Nate helps out a friend. Trouble comes calling, and MacCready learns that Nate isn't the only one with a terrible sense of self-preservation anymore.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> The beginning of this story hints at events that take place in the rest of the stories in my Nate 'n MacCready series, so self-promo lol, but it's not actually necessary to read the other stories in order to make sense of this one! Also Nate and Cait cuss, fair warning for those who aren't into that.

“Be careful out there.” MacCready said again. “I won’t be there to watch your back this time.”

 

“Stop worrying so much.” Nate grinned affectionately at him, not letting him go from their embrace yet. “This week will go fast. Me and Cait will be back before you know it.”

 

“You better.”

 

“You okay with this? With staying here at Sanctuary?” Nate’s expression turned more serious. MacCready had a flashback to the last time he was not okay with being left behind and was only mostly able to suppress a shudder. Nate held him a little tighter, as if able to read his mind. The next words out of his mouth didn’t help convince MacCready that he wasn’t capable of mind reading. “Don’t worry, I’m not going to find any highways to fall off of. And I tuned up my PipBoy to find heat signatures, not just movement. So that means I should see any hiding Raiders, and Deathclaws too. But I’ll stay out of houses with rotting floors anyways.”

 

“Shut up,” MacCready growled, “before I change my mind about you two going off alone.”

 

“We’ll be fine. Promise.”

 

MacCready stiffened when he heard a shrill wolf whistle from somewhere behind him.

 

“Cait must finally be out of bed.” He groused.

 

“Actually, that was Piper.” Nate said sheepishly.

 

“Well, I hate to be the bearer of bad news but my jacket is thin enough that she can see exactly where your hands are right now.”

 

“Right. Sorry.” Nate grinned at MacCready again and squeezed his ass under his jacket before letting him go. “I should probably go find Cait so we can hit the road before the sun gets too high.”

 

“Good luck with that.” MacCready snorted, but it was his turn to grin. “Just remember to duck if any bottles come flying at you. I don’t feel like doing any stitches today.”

 

“Hey now, she’s been getting better.” Nate protested. “That’s kinda the point of this trip too.”

 

“Aw, look at you two.” Piper said once she got into ear range. “Being all domestic and cute.”

 

“Why don’t you go write a story about it or something?” MacCready snarked at her, grumpy about being interrupted.

 

“Maybe I will.” Piper easily tossed back, and MacCready felt his ears go hot. Nate laughed as he tugged MacCready’s hat down over his eyes.

 

“Be nice, Piper, you have all week to put up with each other.” Nate chided. 

 

“Yeah, yeah, Blue, I think we can be grown ups.” Piper waved him off. “And don’t be late, by the way. I promised Nat I’d be back in a week and a half. Ellie is staying with her, but I’d rather not keep them waiting.”

 

“No problem.” Nate saluted her. “Thanks for coming up, Piper. When this new house is up or the week is up, whichever comes first, call Preston or somebody to walk you back to Diamond City.”

 

“Thanks, Blue. We’ll get it done.” Piper looked around. “Where’s Cait? Isn’t she supposed to be going somewhere with you? I’ll go kick her out of bed.”

 

Nate mouthed ‘thank god’ at MacCready as she went looking for the fiery Irish fighter.

 

“Are you sure _you’re_ okay with this?” MacCready turned the question back on Nate. “Cait can be a handful.”

 

“It’ll be fine.” Nate shrugged. “I’ve traveled with her before, before I met you.”

 

“No kidding?” MacCready raised an eyebrow at Nate. He knew Cait fairly well, and it still surprised him that she still willingly hung around with Nate’s crew. Cait was more of a punch-first-ask-questions-later kind of person, while Nate liked to talk things out. Cait would burn a house just to watch it burn, while Nate would scavenge every scrap to build another.

 

Little things like that.

 

“It’ll be fine.” Nate said again as a grumbling and cursing Cait came stumbling out of a nearby house, squinting in the morning sunlight. He grabbed his pack from the ground near his feet and slung it over one shoulder before giving MacCready a quick kiss goodbye. “We’ll be back before you know it. Try not to be too harsh of a slave-driver.”

 

“You know me.” MacCready said dryly. “Always putting those mayor skills to use. Just hurry home, okay? And Cait, watch his back, or I’ll hunt you down too.”

 

“Jeezus, MacCready, have a little faith.” Cait griped. “Worse than a mother hen.”

 

MacCready watched until they had crossed the bridge, where Nate turned and waved before they were out of sight.

 

“Where should we start, boss?” Piper appeared at his elbow.

 

“Boss?” He frowned quizzically at her.

 

“Sure. Blue left you in charge, right? So where do we start?”

 

MacCready shook his head and pulled the folded papers from his jacket pocket. “With the blueprints, I guess. Nate drew them up a few days ago and we went over them. We want to fill in the wall here…”

 

***

 

Four days later, the work was coming along well, MacCready decided. Another day and a half and they’d likely be done. The sun was going down and they were calling it a day, most of the settlers trickling back to their chosen homes while a few more did other repairs and cooked meals over fires. It was just starting to get cool enough that he was missing his jacket, which he had left up at the main house in favour of shirtsleeves in the warmer part of the afternoon. MacCready used the pump-jack to get some water and washed up before drinking his share and headed to the main house for supper.

 

Before he got there, the alarm bell began ringing, and he heard gunfire on the southwest corner of the settlement.

 

Biting back a curse, he started running. He had a pistol strapped to his thigh, but his rifle was in the main house. When he got to the house, Piper was trying to keep order without any success. Everyone was panicking, and it didn’t take long to figure out why.

 

“It’s Gunners!” A settler that he couldn’t remember the name of wailed. “Why are there Gunners all the way up here!”

 

MacCready grabbed Piper and pulled her down the hall to his and Nate’s room.

 

“Mac, what are you doing? We need to be out there!” Piper tugged at his grip.

 

“Yes we do, but we need supplies.” MacCready said grimly. “Piper, do you know where Preston is this week? Please don’t tell me he’s at the Castle.”

 

“No, he’s just doing some work with the Minutemen in Concord this week. Maybe they’ll hear the commotion.” She added hopefully.

 

“There’s too many hills. They won’t hear anything. You need to go get them, Piper.”

 

“What? Me?” Piper was stunned as he started quickly strapping mixed pieces of armour on her and then put their last two Stealthboys on her shoulders.

 

“You know how to use these?”

 

“Well, yeah—”

 

“Good, because you need to _go_.” MacCready grabbed his rifle and then her hand again and pulled her back down the hall, watching windows carefully. It was dark already, and it was difficult to see, but it was evident from the gunfire and shouts that Gunners were already overrunning the settlement.

 

“Oh, _god_.” Piper breathed.

 

“Don’t use the bridge. Go through the river, but try not to get too wet.” MacCready kept his voice low. “Slow and steady. Stay out of the light.”

 

“Come with me. There’s two Stealthboys.”

 

“Can’t do that. Promised Nate I’d watch out for these people, and you might need the second one.” MacCready winced when he heard a shrill scream outside. “Stay behind me until we’re outside, then stick to the shadows until you get to the river.”

 

“MacCready,” Piper started, stopped. MacCready finished loading his rifle and strapped on his armour, waiting. She finally finished, “good luck.”

 

“You too, Piper.”

 

He stayed low as he left the doorway and went for the concrete wall nearby as bullets pinged off the wall around him. Piper disappeared behind the bush that edged the garden, and he didn’t see another trace of her.

 

“ _Noooo_!” MacCready heard an angry shriek from across the settlement and dared to lift his head a bit to see Marcy being dragged by her hair across the ground, kicking and screaming. Another shot forced him back into cover, but it didn’t take long before he realized there were more settlers being taken captive by the Gunners. He managed to get more than a few shots off from where he was, but he knew he couldn’t stay there forever.

 

“MacCready!” This time it was Sturges yelling for help, panic evident in his voice. MacCready could feel his own panic building in his chest. He was outgunned, and unable to get any more shots off from his current position. What were these Gunners playing at, taking this many captives? Ransom or slaves?

 

MacCready broke cover, intending to go for a better position to help Sturges.

 

He felt the bullet tear through his left thigh near instantaneously. He collapsed the second that leg went to take his weight again, and there was a stunned moment before his fumbling hands found the torn and wet fabric at his thigh and applied pressure, sending lightning bolts of pain through his leg, but he stubbornly kept applying the pressure even as he felt hot blood slipping through his fingers.

 

He managed to get his belt undone and cinched it tight around his left thigh above the gunshot wound as a tourniquet. Head spinning, he looked around to see that no one appeared to be taking notice of him, so he slung his rifle across his back and set himself to crawling to the cover of the house he had been going for earlier.

 

“Get back here!” Someone yelled as a big hand grabbed the back of his shirt. Heart racing, MacCready went for the pistol at his thigh, but whoever had grabbed him was faster. 

 

_Still losing blood_ , he thought somewhat deliriously just before something hard cracked against his skull and everything slid sideways into darkness.

 

***

 

He awoke propped up against someone warm, and the next thing he was aware of was the white hot agony centered in his thigh. He couldn’t stop the groan of pain and tried to move, hoping that a change of position would help, but it only made it worse.

 

“Don’t move, MacCready.” Sturges said above him. “Your leg is in bad shape. Bullet went all the way through, but made a real mess.”

 

MacCready pried his eyes open and struggled to sit up anyway, ignoring Sturges’ protests and trying to ignore the pain in his leg and head while trying to figure out where they were.

 

It was the living room of one of the houses in the Sanctuary settlement, he knew that much. The furniture had been completely cleared out, leaving him, Sturges, Marcy, Jun, Mama Murphy, and about ten settlers on the floor. The windows and doors had been boarded over, and a new lock was on the only swinging door to the outside. Barely any light was getting in, but he could see that it was day already, meaning he had slept at least the whole night away.

 

“What is going on?” MacCready croaked, his throat feeling cracked and dry. “How long was I out?”

 

“I think it’s mid morning by now, so you slept a good twelve hours or more.” Sturges said. “As for what the Gunners are up to, I have no idea. They locked us up in here last night and I haven’t seen them since. I hope they bring water soon.”

 

MacCready scanned the mixture of scared and angry faces in the room, blinking frequently to try and clear his vision. He absently felt his shoulder for his rifle strap and felt neither it, his armour, or his jacket and felt naked.

 

“Is everyone okay?” Another thought occurred to him. “We’re missing people. Where are they?”

 

“We don’t know.” Marcy said defiantly, her angry attitude firmly in place. “On account of fighting for our own lives. I don’t know if you noticed but it got a little crazy out there.”

 

“People scattered.” Another settler offered a little more helpfully. “Davis went down. I think she was dead. But Martin and Becky got away, I saw them go north across the creek towards the vault.”

 

“I didn’t see Piper.” Sturges said in a low voice.

 

“She got away.” MacCready pitched his voice low as well, making sure no one else heard. A glance at his leg showed that his makeshift tourniquet had been removed and replaced with a thick bandage that covered most of his thigh and was showing spots of blood. There was a substantial amount of blood on the floor, his pants, his hands, and he saw that Sturges wasn’t much cleaner.

 

“You sure?”

 

“She made it.” MacCready had to lean back and close his eyes in the hopes that the room would stop spinning. “I know she did.”

 

“This is because of you!” An angry settler accused from across the room, raising his voice to be heard. “Did you let your Gunner friends know that the General would be gone this week?”

 

MacCready slowly opened his eyes again, suddenly feeling even more vulnerable laid out on the floor. Sturges had a look that was a mixture of indignation and resignation on his face, but didn’t say anything in his defence. It was the smart move, MacCready knew. Now was not a time to acknowledge that there were sides, let alone take one.

 

“Why would he rat out his boyfriend’s homebase, genius?” Another settler spoke up before he could say anything. “And why would he be shot and locked up in here if he had?”

 

“Deals go wrong all the time! Maybe they cut him out of it.”

 

There was more arguing but the settler that had started the accusations was eventually shouted down and everyone settled into grumbling, but there seemed to be a general agreement that MacCready wasn’t so stupid as to have had a deal with the Gunners go so spectacularly badly for him.

 

“MacCready hasn’t run with Gunners in over a year.” Sturges finally spoke up. MacCready wondered who had told him that. “Him and Nate took care of the ones that were giving him a hard time months ago already. These guys likely don’t know him from Adam. And it’s better if it stays that way. Capiche?”

 

It was late evening when the door rattled as it was suddenly unlocked and four heavily armed Gunners strode in before the one that MacCready was willing to bet money was in charge walked in. She had to be close to six feet tall, built like a tank, and had a thick scar that tugged at the corner of her right eye and traced part ways down her cheek. Her blond hair was pulled back into a harsh ponytail, and her blood type tattoo was by far overshadowed by the black tattoo that seemed to consist mostly of skulls and thick tribal stripes and blocks that covered the shaved side of her head, down the side of her neck, and disappeared under her jacket. The Gunners around her gave her a respectful distance.

 

MacCready was getting a bad feeling about her.

 

“Which one of you is MacCready?” Her voice was strong and cold. No one said anything, and Sturges grabbed MacCready’s shoulder when he moved to sit up.

 

“I am.” MacCready tried to shrug Sturges off. He could barely sit up on his own, weak with blood loss and thirst. “Who’s asking?”

 

“Call me Vandal.” She turned to address the group of prisoners in general. “Who is the Sole Survivor to you?”

 

“Nate?” Sturges blurted with a quizzical frown.

 

“General of the Minutemen.” Another settler offered.

 

“And who is Preston Garvey?”

 

“His second in command.” MacCready answered that one, and there were several heads nodding in agreement in the room. “When Nate isn’t around, Garvey speaks for him.”

 

Vandal turned on her heel and left again. MacCready and the others looked at each other in confusion, but it was quiet for about twenty minutes until they heard distant shouting and gunfire. Another half hour passed, and a bloodied Preston Garvey was dragged in and dumped on the floor and locked in with them.

 

“Garvey,” MacCready croaked, “what happened? Are you okay?”

 

“I’m okay.” Preston spit a mouthful of blood on the floor. “Some of my men aren’t. Tried to reason with this ‘Vandal’ and pay the ransom for you all, but she wouldn’t hear it. Killed two of my men and ran the rest off.”

 

“I’m sorry.” The words sounded lame in his own ears, but Preston nodded gravely at him.

 

The next morning, a bucket of water was dropped on the floor.

 

“For drinking.” One of the Gunners said. “That’s all I’m bringing today so be smart about it.”

 

There was a stampede as soon as they shut the door, but Sturges stood and waded his way to the front and made everyone take their turn so that everyone got at least a mouthful.

 

The sun was high overhead when they came for MacCready. A few people tried to protest, but the Gunners were heavy handed with their punishment and MacCready called them off, not wanting anyone to get hurt. 

 

The Gunners had to all but drag him out as his shot up leg refused to hold him, and his left foot snagged the doorframe, whiting out his vision with a burst of agony in his thigh. When the world came back into focus, his breath was whistling in and out of his lungs as he wheezed. They didn’t have far to go though, as they dragged him into the main house and threw him into a chair and bound his wrists tightly to the arms of the chair, then went to tie his legs to the chair as well.

 

“C’mon, I was shot, you don’t have to do that,” MacCready said desperately, “just leave it.”

 

His pleas fell on deaf ears as the Gunner grabbed his left ankle and forced his knee to bend to tie his leg to the chair.

 

The scream ripped out of him before he could even think of stifling it. He wasn’t sure how long he blacked out for, but it wasn’t long enough as far as he was concerned. His leg felt larger than life, even though it looked mostly normal sized, and the throbbing pain was unbearable. Hot blood was trickling down his thigh where the movement had broken the wound open again.

 

So absorbed in his misery, MacCready had no idea how long he was tied in that chair. Fever ravaged him, making it difficult to think and giving him a terrible headache. People came and went, asking him questions, but he stubbornly held his tongue and squeezed his eyes shut as if it could help as they kicked and punched and slapped him, trying to wring what they could from him.

 

He clung to the knowledge that Nate was coming. MacCready wished he wouldn’t, but knew he would. He was due home in a few days anyway, but someone probably had figured out how to get him a radio message by now to tell him what was going on.

 

Sanctuary Hills was Nate’s home, and had been for a very long time. And not only that, but there was a group of people that Nate had become fond of that had also made it home. 

 

Nate’s sense of self-preservation had never been very high in MacCready’s opinion, particularly when it came to helping others and righting what he perceived to be ‘wrong’, which was another thing about him that was incredibly old fashioned and came straight out of pre-war books that MacCready had read as a kid in the caves. It was infuriating some days, particularly when MacCready was just looking to make a few caps and get out with their hides still intact, but he had accepted that it was what made Nate who he was.

 

A particularly hard slap brought him back to reality, and MacCready was startled into jerking upright and opened his eyes, blearily realizing that Vandal herself had come in.

 

“Who are you?” She circled the chair he was in slowly. He squeezed his eyes shut for a moment, desperately wishing he could just have some water to drink and a minute to clear his head.

 

She bent over to wrap her hand firmly around the bandages on his thigh, pressing her thumb against the center of the worst bloodstain. He knew she wasn’t even pressing hard yet, but the pain was enough that MacCready bucked uselessly against his restraints, biting his lip to keep from yelling.

 

“They already told me your name. I just want to hear it from you.” Vandal said reasonably.

 

But that was the problem, wasn’t it? She seemed reasonable now but MacCready knew how this game went. It starts with easy questions. Harmless questions. Those lead to slightly more complicated questions. Questions that may or may not make a difference in the long run. And once you’ve answered all those, what does it matter if you answer a few more?

 

MacCready stubbornly pressed his lips together. It was better not to start answering at all.

 

Vandal dug her thumb deeply into the wound. MacCready threw his head back and screamed, overwhelmed by the pain that lit him up.

 

“What’s your name?” Vandal demanded, squeezing his thigh. “Who are you?”

 

Just when MacCready started trying to think of a plan for pushing her into killing him instead of dragging it out, the door opened again.

 

“Ma’am, the target is passing by the Red Rocket now.” The Gunner goon reported. “He got your message.”

 

MacCready felt his heart leap despite the pain and fear. Nate was coming. He always fixed things. He’d fix this.

 

“Good. Get them ready.” Vandal ordered, and came to cut MacCready out of the chair as he was still wheezing and shaking in pain. “Get up.”

 

He shakily tried to rise, but his leg wouldn’t support him and she lost patience. A toss of her head was enough to order two of her men to grab him and drag him outside to the grassy hillside where the other settlers were also being gathered in a group, surrounded by armed Gunners.

 

Instead of throwing him in with the other settlers, Vandal’s goons kept him apart. His gut clenched, and he exchanged a wide-eyed look with Preston across the field.

 

“Vandal, what do you think you’re—” MacCready was cut off by a grunt when he was punched hard in the gut, and he sagged in the Gunner’s arms, struggling for air. Vandal ignored him, watching Nate slowly walk up the hill.

 

MacCready watched him come with equal parts dread and relief. He wanted to yell at him to run, to get out of there, but he knew it would be no use. There was no way Nate would back down from this, and as much as MacCready would have liked to see him walk away he couldn’t blame him one bit.

 

“You can stop there.” Vandal ordered when Nate was still about thirty feet away. When he didn’t stop immediately, the Gunner beside MacCready nervously cocked his pistol and pressed it to his ribs, and Nate reluctantly came to a stop and put his hands out to the sides.

 

“You don’t have to do this.” Nate said.

 

“I’m aware of that.” Vandal threw back. “But I’ve been bored and I want to. So here we are.”

 

“What do you want? Your message didn’t say.”

 

“Like I just told you, ‘Sole’, I’m bored. I was looking for a challenge. Instead, I basically walked in here. Sure, this one,” she had strolled over to MacCready and grabbed him by the chin for a second before continuing, “managed to snipe a fair few of my men before I took him down, but once he was down it was easy pickings.”

 

“Nate, I’m sorry,” MacCready tried but took another punch to the gut and doubled over again. For some reason he only distantly realized then that his pant leg was a mess, completely soaked with blood past his knee and streaked the rest of the way to his ankle. 

 

_No way am I getting that stain out_ , he thought absently, then, _Focus. Focus!_

 

“I want five thousand caps.” Vandal was saying.

 

“Done.” Nate said immediately. MacCready would have smacked him if he had been standing by him. Nate likely had it and then some thanks to his scavenging and charming ways, but he had given in too quickly. 

 

“But I wasn’t finished yet.” Vandal sulked. “I want five thousand caps, and then you make a choice. For five thousand caps, you get either Sanctuary, the settlers, or him.” She pointed at MacCready on the last one. “Whoever or whatever you don’t pick, I kill or keep. Your choice.”

 

MacCready felt all the blood drain from his face. A few of the settlers cried out in dismay but quieted when guns were pointed at them, and they could only wait in fear while their fate was decided for them. MacCready tried to think of how Vandal could possibly know enough about him and Nate to use him like this, and could only come up with that a guard had overheard the settlers and Sturges talking when they were locked up.

 

“I have a better deal.” Nate said. “I give you ten thousand caps and you walk away right now.”

 

“I think you’re misunderstanding me, ‘Sole’. I said I am bored, not broke.” Vandal said impatiently. “However, now that you offer it, I’ll make it ten thousand caps and you still pick one of the three.”

 

Nate’s fists were clenched. MacCready slowly looked from his fists to his face and saw that he was looking at him, his expression haunted.

 

MacCready thought about Duncan. He knew Nate would take care of him now if anything happened to him. He looked over at the settlers and thought of all their families, and then looked back at Nate.

 

“Don’t you dare pick me.” He said, voice only wavering a little.

 

“RJ,” Nate started, just as a few settlers began crying and begging for their lives.

 

“I mean it, Nate.” MacCready tried to make his voice stronger but didn’t think he quite managed it. “I’ll hate you forever if you pick me.”

 

“I need those ten thousand caps now.” Vandal ordered. “Or I’ll just kill them all.”

 

“Alright!” Nate slung his pack off his back and rummaged until he pulled out his caps tin. He held it in his hands, looking at the settlers, the settlement, and then MacCready, who just slowly shook his head at him. 

 

Nate’s eyes suddenly welled up and he finally threw the tin at Vandal’s feet.

 

“What’s it going to be?” Vandal grinned wickedly, cocking her modified .44 pistol and looking pointedly at her men with guns pointed at the settlers, including Preston and the others. “Who do you choose to live? Or are you going to pick the place that’s been home for over two hundred years?”

 

Nate took a deep breath before clapping his hands over his mouth, looking at MacCready while tears flowed down his face.

 

“It’s okay.” MacCready said. “I love you. Take care of Duncan. Don’t pick me.”

 

“The settlers.” Nate gasped out. “I choose the settlers.”

 

It took MacCready a second to realize why his ears were ringing. Vandal had her pistol pointed at him, and he slowly looked down and saw two small stains of red suddenly turn into a large stain of red on his chest and stomach.

 

His guards let him go and he fell to the ground bonelessly, his remaining strength giving out all at once.

 

“ _RJ!_ ” He distantly heard Nate scream.

 

“Take your settlers and get out of my settlement.” Vandal said. MacCready wondered if she had intended for him to bleed out slowly. Joke was on her if she meant for it to hurt, though. He couldn’t feel much yet, just a dull ache in his chest.

 

“Everybody, _go_.” Preston said in his take-charge voice. “C’mon, people, move!”

 

“Let me,” Nate’s voice broke, “ _God_ , let me take his body, at least!”

 

MacCready was looking up at open sky, wishing it was something else as something wet trickled from his eyes. Was he wanting a cave ceiling or a familiar face right now? He wasn’t sure. 

 

Running footsteps, then it was Nate over him and warm hands were smoothing over his face and neck, feeling for his pulse, then Nate was burying his face in the crook of his neck, his shoulders shaking.

 

“RJ, don’t move, don’t make a sound.” Nate breathed into his ear. “I’m so sorry. I love you. I’m going to get you out of this. Close your eyes and play dead.”

 

MacCready honestly wasn’t sure how long he could play at being dead before he would actually be dead but he obliged and closed his eyes.

 

Nate carefully picked him up and held him close, but the movement awoke both new and old pain. Playing dead was more difficult than MacCready anticipated, but he let his head loll and his limbs hung limply. His lungs screamed for oxygen, but he could barely manage any breaths.

 

The walk down the hill to the bridge was torture. MacCready could hear Gunner guards escorting them, and knew he had to keep up the act, but it was growing even more difficult to not make a sound.

 

They were past the Red Rocket before Nate suddenly stopped and gently let MacCready down to the ground. Something in his chest seized and forced him to take a wet, gurgling breath, and he let out a painful moan.

 

“RJ, baby, I’m sorry, hang on.” Nate sounded panicked, rummaging through his pack again.

 

“Oh my God!” Preston exclaimed, running over and dropping to a knee beside them. He looked over his shoulder worriedly and lowered his voice. “He’s alive?”

 

MacCready blearily looked up at them, but his vision was going grey at the edges.

 

“Barely. I need to get him help.” Nate had Stimpacks and MedX, but Preston tore MacCready’s shirt open and grabbed bandages out of Nate’s pack and carefully placed them before applying pressure. MacCready blacked out for a minute, choking on a scream.

 

“...Stimpacks aren’t gonna cut it. He’s got busted ribs, and they’re bad.” Preston’s gaze shifted back to MacCready as he came around. MacCready coughed and choked on the thick liquid bubbling in his throat again and was wracked by a fit of shivering. Nate lifted MacCready off the ground again, and MacCready closed his eyes and leaned against him, exhausted and hurting. It felt like a weight sat on his chest and each breath smacked wetly in the back of his throat.

 

“What the hell happened?” Cait shouted as she suddenly came running from somewhere, carrying her own and Nate’s weapons. “I knew I should have come!”

 

“Preston will explain. Preston, I need you to take care of the settlers.” Nate said hoarsely.

 

“You know I will.” Preston said immediately. “What are you planning?”

 

“I’m going to my son.”

 

It took a few seconds for that to sink into MacCready’s fogged brain, but he felt his hand twitch and he tried to pry his eyes open without success. Cait cursed loudly, voicing her opinion in few but clear words.

 

“The Institute!” Preston exclaimed. “I know he’s your son, but _you_ know you can’t trust them!”

 

“I know.” Nate said in despair. “But they’ll be able to help. I have to go.”

 

“General, I’m sorry you had to make that choice, but can’t you go anywhere else? The Railroad has a good doctor. Hell, go to the Brotherhood!”

 

“He doesn’t have that kind of time. Take care of these settlers. Warn the nearby settlements, tell everyone to be on guard. I’ll be back.”

 

MacCready’s vision went white and the world dropped out from under him. When it came back, his ears were ringing and there were shocked gasps and exclamations around them.

 

“Tell Father that I’m here.” Nate told someone, already moving again. “He needs medical help.”

 

MacCready tried to open his eyes again and must have succeeded this time because he found himself looking up at Nate’s grimy face. His jaw was set while his eyes were wild, hurrying through a place that MacCready had never seen before.

 

“RJ, it’s going to be okay.” Nate looked down and saw that his eyes were open as he was pushing his way through some double doors into another area. “Just stay with me. Please, RJ.”

 

MacCready wanted to respond, wanted to at least tell him that he loved him, and to tell him to tell Duncan that he loved him, but as soon as his lips parted his body failed him. No words emerged, and he found that no more air passed in and out of his lungs either. He weakly spasmed in Nate’s arms.

 

“Help him!” Nate’s scream sounded like it came from down a tunnel as he was laid on a cold surface. MacCready somehow caught Nate’s clothing and weakly clung to him, and Nate grabbed his hand and held it tightly. His eyes were still open but his vision had gone dim and he didn’t see the hands that were suddenly on him, removing sodden bandages and sliding needles into his forearm and back of his hand and jabbing another into his neck. 

 

“Hang on, RJ. I’m not leaving you. I promise. Just hang on.”

 

MacCready barely heard Nate’s voice, couldn’t really understand what he was saying, but took comfort knowing he was close as the darkness crashed down heavily on him.


	2. Chapter 2

 

Consciousness came slowly. He was warm and when his hand twitched it scratched against soft sheets. Someone was gently rubbing his arm, and he frowned before he remembered how to open his heavy eyelids.

 

“RJ?” Nate was leaning over him, looking like a wreck. His face was still grimy, eyes bloodshot, and his shirt was stained with blood, MacCready blearily noticed. He tried to point it out and only managed a weak gasp, and Nate quickly gave him something he called “ice chips” and tasted like heaven.

 

“You okay?” MacCready finally rasped, reaching out to finger Nate’s shirt. Nate looked down as if seeing it for the first time.

 

“Yeah. It’s not mine.” Nate didn’t meet MacCready’s eyes for a moment before looking at him again. “How are you feeling?”

 

MacCready had to think about that one for a moment. His brain felt foggy, and he was pretty sure he was heavily drugged even though he couldn’t think of why that would be. There was a dull ache in his chest, like a bruise that promised to hurt more if he moved or touched it, his left thigh was bandaged, and his fingers found a square patch of gauze just above and behind his ear, as if he had taken a hit to the head. He looked around in confusion, not recognizing anything around him. Everything was so _clean_ and perfect looking.

 

He opened his mouth to ask Nate what the heck was going on, when that last observation sunk in and his memories started coming back.

 

Vandal, the Gunners, Sanctuary falling, Nate’s impossible choice, and then somehow getting him to the Institute anyway. MacCready gingerly laid his hands over his chest where he remembered being shot and felt the bandages.

 

“I’m so sorry, RJ.” Fresh tears tracked down Nate’s face. “I didn’t— I couldn’t— I wanted to pick you. God help me, I would have picked you in a heartbeat over all of them. The look on your face— and then when she shot you—”

 

“Hey, it’s okay.” MacCready reached for Nate and he enveloped his hand in both of his. His voice was cracked and quieter than he expected but he pushed on. “I can’t believe I’m about to say this, but I meant it when I told you to pick them. There’s more of them. And they have families too. And you can’t lose Preston, as much as I hate those endless Minutemen jobs he sends us on.”

 

“I can’t lose you.” Nate said brokenly. “I wanted to die when I saw you fall.”

 

“Don’t get sappy on me.” MacCready said, tears in his own eyes now. “I’m alive. You pulled me out of the fire. I’m here.”

 

Nate pressed his lips to MacCready’s hand and closed his eyes tightly, and MacCready took a minute to take in the fact that this was real and he actually _was_ alive. He would see Duncan again.

 

“I shouldn’t have left. Its my fault.” Nate eventually sat back and ran his hands through his hair, eyes still noticeably bloodshot. “Now we’ve got settlers _dead_ , we’re down a settlement _and_ a homebase, they’ve got all our shit, and most importantly _you almost died_.”

 

“So, what?” MacCready frowned at him. “You planning on never leaving home again? Never help a friend out again? Never let me out of your sight? I mean, nice sentiment, but the reality sucks. This is life in the Commonwealth. All those settlers know that, and are willing to take the risk because their lives really are better when they live in one of your settlements.”

 

“I need to be more careful.”

 

“Don’t even _start_.” MacCready groused. “We go through this every time there’s an accident or an ambush or whatever. They’re called those names for a reason. If you tip-toe any more I’m going solo.”

 

Nate actually looked crushed, which was not what MacCready had intended at all.

 

“Nate, I’m kidding, come here.” MacCready lifted his arm and winced when it moved the IV port taped into the back of his hand. Nate hesitated, but got on the edge of the bed to lay alongside him, careful of bandages and IV. “I’m bad at this. I’m trying to say it’s not your fault and there’s nothing you could have done differently.”

 

“You shouldn’t be the one trying to make me feel better. This is not like you, by the way. I mean, I know you have a heart of gold, but you usually keep it a little more buried.”

 

“Maybe it’s the drugs.” MacCready admitted. “Pretty sure it’s just from hanging out with you too much though.”

 

“Speaking of the drugs, are you feeling okay? Should I get the doctor?” Nate looked at him worriedly.

 

“I’m fine for now.” MacCready was feeling more achy than when he woke up but didn’t want him to move yet.

 

“Are you mad at me for bringing you here?” Nate asked. “To the Institute, I mean.”

 

“Maybe. I dunno.”

 

“What, really?”

 

“I’m alive, aren’t I? Kinda hard to be mad about seeing you and being able to see my kid again someday. I thought I was a goner.”

 

Nate buried his face in the crook of MacCready’s neck, and MacCready rubbed his back comfortingly.

 

“When can we get out of here? Will they let us go?”

 

“You literally just woke up.” Nate pulled back to press his lips in a hard line at him. “You’re worse than a kid. This isn’t something you just stick with a Stimpack and keep on running.”

 

“So, tomorrow?”

 

Nate sighed. “Yeah, hopefully tomorrow. And they’ll let us go. I’m pretty sure. I’ll take care of it.”

 

MacCready smirked at him and then winced when something twinged inside him with his next breath. The softly beeping machine nearby starting beeping a little faster. Nate nearly leapt out of the bed, still as careful as if MacCready was made of glass, and smacked a button on the wall.

 

“You should have said you were starting to hurt.” Nate scolded.

 

“It only just started.” MacCready grumbled, trying to shift to a more comfortable position. By the time a nurse arrived, he was sweating; his thigh was aching, his chest another monster entirely, and his headache was nothing to dismiss either.

 

“That wore off way too fast.” MacCready rasped as the nurse injected something into his IV line.

 

“You just had reconstructive surgery on your ribs to piece them back together, and I’ll leave the list of soft tissue damage to the doctor.” The nurse informed him. “You need to keep all movement, including talking, to a minimum, until at least tomorrow.”

 

“What happens tomorrow?” Nate shot a guilty look at MacCready, taking his hand again and likely blaming himself for MacCready talking.

 

“We’ll do another X-Ray and determine if the surgery was enough of a success to apply Stimpacks, and if so you’ll be on your way.”

 

“They let us go?” MacCready asked muzzily. The drugs seemed to be kicking in already because everything felt floaty and the pain was settling into the dull ache again.

 

“You know Father could use you,” the nurse began, talking to Nate over MacCready.

 

“I know he could use me.” Nate said cryptically. “And I know I owe him now.”

 

“He wanted to be very clear that he doesn’t see this as a debt.” The nurse said after a moment.

 

“I bet.” Nate snorted. “What’s your name?”

 

The nurse hesitated. “G5-43.”

 

Nate didn’t bat an eye. “I could ask you how you feel about how Father uses you and your brothers and sisters, but I won’t be so cruel. I know there’s listening devices in here. But yes, I know just how well he could use me, like he uses all his other ‘tools’.”

 

“Is there anything more I can get you?” The nurse asked as if he hadn’t just said that. “A cot, perhaps? You haven’t slept since arriving.”

 

“I’m fine, thank you.” Nate said wearily. “That will be all.”

 

MacCready pried open heavy eyelids once she had left.

 

“Haven’t slept?” He slurred. Nate sat down beside him and took his hand.

 

“Shh, RJ, just get some sleep. I’ll keep watch.”

 

That worried MacCready, but the drugs coursing through his veins took matters out of his hands and he drifted off.

 

***

 

MacCready woke up with his head bouncing off of a hard shoulder. He groggily opened his eyes and lifted his head and looked blearily at Nate, who was watching intently where he was going as he hurried along, breathing heavily, as if he’d been keeping this pace up for a while.

 

“What is happening.” MacCready’s voice came out as a croak as he tried to look around and had to slam his eyes shut against the sunlight, and he turned his face against Nate’s chest as he struggled to clear his foggy brain and figure out what was going on. One thing he was definitely aware of was that his feet were bare and cold.

 

“RJ? Are you awake?” Nate asked, sounding worried. “Like, really awake this time?”

 

MacCready squinted up at him. “Yeah?”

 

“Okay, hang on.” Nate looked around before switching course slightly. “We’ll take a break for a minute.”

 

“That’d be good.” MacCready said in a daze.

 

“What do you remember?” Nate asked as he did a visual check inside a broken down house and set MacCready down on a kitchen chair. MacCready lost his balance and would have toppled if Nate hadn’t caught him, and realized he was wrapped in a blanket. It took him a moment to respond.

 

“Institute.” He finally managed, and frowned in confusion. “Did I sleep in? Or did we leave early?”

 

“Left early. I found your X-Rays on a terminal, and realized that they were stalling. For what reason, I didn’t want to find out. But, you were already doped to the eyeballs, so I had to hit you with a Stimpack and pack you out of there as fast as possible.” Nate handed him a can of purified water. “Drink this. Holy crap, your feet are _blue_. Sorry, I was in such a hurry…”

 

He pulled MacCready’s socks from his pack and started trying to put one on his foot while MacCready downed half the can of water.

 

“Give me that.” MacCready grouched, shrugging out of the blanket to grab the socks from Nate and realizing then he was in a hospital gown. “Where are my clothes? And my hat!”

 

“Hat is at the bottom of my bag, we do not have time right now. Your pants and shirt were a write off, but the Institute was kind enough to replace them.”

 

“You stole them.” MacCready clarified as he took the pants from Nate and then finished off the water. He could already tell he was thinking more clearly.

 

“I stole them.” Nate confirmed. “And I’m sorry, but I haven’t seen your jacket.”

 

“It’s at Sanctuary.” MacCready said gloomily, and scowled when Nate shoved a shirt over his head. “Why are we in such a hurry?”

 

“I got us out of the Institute in a hurry, and I’m not sure how happy Shaun’s gonna be about it so just making sure we’re staying ahead of any trailing synths. I used our last Stealthboy so I don’t think we were followed though.” Nate hurriedly pulled MacCready’s boots out of his pack and set them at his feet for him to put on. “And I want to get to Sunshine Tidings Co-op before it gets dark and meet up with Preston, make sure everyone is okay.”

 

“What if they send a courser after us? We’d be leading it right to them.” MacCready pointed out the ugly truth and saw that Nate hadn’t even considered it when the colour drained from his face. Nate sat down heavily on the floor. 

 

MacCready considered his haggard boyfriend as he stood and finished getting dressed. Nate was just as, if not more grimy than MacCready remembered him being when he walked into Sanctuary. His eyes were bloodshot and red rimmed, his hair was a mess, his face and clothes filthy, and his hands were shaking slightly as he pulled a leather jacket out of his pack.

 

“It’s cold out.” Nate absently offered the jacket to MacCready, who gratefully put it on. Didn’t fit as nice as his duster, but it was better than nothing in the cool evening air. He sat down beside Nate.

 

“I don’t know what to do.” Nate whispered a few minutes later, eyes wide and staring off into the distance. Two of the walls of the house were missing, giving them a view of grassy hills and dead looking trees as the sun went down, but he looked trapped. “We’re out of Stealthboys, I used the last one—”

 

“Nate, you’re exhausted. How long have you been going?” MacCready put an arm around him. “You need to sleep. We’ll figure it out then.”

 

“With a courser on our tails? We can’t sleep.” Nate struggled to his feet. “There’s too much to do. Make sure no one follows us to the settlers, then make sure the settlers are okay, then talk to Preston about how many Minutemen we’ve got, and see how many friends I can call in favours with, so we can _take back Sanctuary_.” 

 

Nate repeatedly smacked his fist into his palm for emphasis at the end of his sentence. MacCready thought he sounded slightly deranged, but could tell he had been thinking about this for a while.

 

“Okay, first of all it's a hypothetical courser so far.” MacCready steered Nate towards the kitchen chair he had been sitting in and parked him in it. “Second of all, if they do send one, is it going to really matter if you’re awake or not?”

 

“Yes!” Nate said, offended. MacCready made a face at him. “Well, maybe. The two of us might stand a chance.”

 

“If we were given a twenty mile head start. And had a Fatman. Maybe.”

 

Nate deflated. “We’re dead.” He moaned.

 

“No, we’re not.” MacCready grabbed Nate’s pack and pulled out his sleeping bag. “Not yet. So you’re going to get some sleep, and then come up with the plan.”

 

“I don’t know if I can.” Nate said hopelessly. “My brain is going a hundred miles an hour.”

 

“Don’t worry about it. If you worry about not being able to sleep you won’t be able to.” MacCready pulled the dusty cushions off the couch, tossed them on the floor near the wall in the best shelter and unrolled the sleeping bag on the cushions and motioned for Nate to climb in. Nate hesitated, then quickly ran upstairs to do a sweep and then made sure there wasn’t a basement for anything to hide in before he came back and stripped off his boots and climbed into the sleeping bag.

 

“I still don’t think I’m going to be able to sleep.” Nate fretted, and was snoring thirty seconds later.

 

MacCready shook his head in fond exasperation, and quietly went about getting ready for a night of standing watch. Nate didn’t even stir, sleeping like the dead.

 

After a fairly uneventful night and just before the sun rose, MacCready made a fire and starting making some breakfast. To his surprise, Nate still didn’t stir, but slept on. The sun was well on its way up before he abruptly sat up and blearily looked at MacCready and then his PipBoy.

 

“It’s eight thirty!” Nate exclaimed. “Why didn’t you wake me?”

 

MacCready rolled his eyes and shoved a bowl of squirrel stew at him with a can of water. Nate opened his mouth to say something more and ended up yawning widely, and meekly sat back and ate his stew and drank his water without saying anything else.

 

“Feel better?” MacCready asked when he was done.

 

“Yeah. Thanks.” Nate set the bowl aside.

 

“Guess what?”

 

“What?” Nate asked with interest.

 

“Didn’t see a single synth or courser.” MacCready reported with a grin. “I heard some synths tangle with some super mutants in that abandoned village over there, but they weren’t close enough to worry about. They don’t know where we are. I’d say you got us out free and clear.”

 

Nate stood and grabbed MacCready in a hug. “I think I’m still tired because I might cry.”

 

“That’s normal for you, but whatever you say, boss.” MacCready hugged him back and dodged the playful nudge to his side.

 

“How are you feeling?” Nate stepped back and looked him over. “I just hauled you out of a hospital bed yesterday after major surgery. Let me take a look you.”

 

MacCready grumbled about it but let him, knowing Nate wouldn’t let it go until he got his way anyway. He was feeling pretty good, maybe a little achy and sore, and Nate must have found something he didn’t like because he gave him another Stimpack.

 

“Okay, okay, stop fussing.” MacCready waved him off and put his shirt and jacket back on, aches and pains completely gone now. “What’s the plan?”

 

“So I was thinking,” Nate immediately began, sitting down and scratching out a rough sketch of Sanctuary in the dirt with a stick, “remember how I made that cellar into a bit of a bunker?”

 

“Oh, crap.” MacCready remembered alright. He had helped with some of it. “All your mini nukes are down there. And your power armour. Did you lock it, at least?”

 

“I locked it!” Nate said defensively. “Although its best protection from those Gunners is going to be staying hidden. I hope it has, because we’re screwed otherwise. So, I’m thinking I’ll sneak in, grab a suit, and a Fatman, and as many mini nukes as I can carry, and then—”

 

“Whoa, whoa, _you_ sneak in? As in by yourself?”

 

“Sure. The fewer the better. Less to detect.”

 

MacCready folded his arms. “No way. I’m not letting you go in to a Gunner camp without anyone to watch your back. That place is going to be _swarming_.”

 

“Fine, _we_ sneak in. If they haven’t found the bunker it should be easy, with it being on the edge of the settlement.”

 

“Don’t jinx us.”

 

“Nothing about this is going to be easy.” Nate buried his fingers in the longer part of the hair on the top of his head and stared at what he had scratched in the dirt. “Do you know how much easier my life would be if _cars_ or _phones_ still worked?”

 

“I can only imagine.” MacCready said dryly. “Who do you need to talk to?”

 

“Preston, mostly. But wouldn’t mind checking around to see who else I could call in some favours with.” Nate said gloomily.

 

“Then let’s go.” MacCready stood and started packing up camp. “Won’t take long to get to Sunshine Tidings.”

 

***

 

There was far more happening at the usually idyllic settlement when they arrived than MacCready expected. Most of the Sanctuary settlers had chosen to follow Preston there, and had filled it past capacity, but the Minuteman second-in-command obviously hadn’t wasted a moment in putting people to work making more beds and shelter for those that needed it. The place was a hive of activity, and MacCready was pulled one way and Nate another as soon as they arrived.

 

It was late evening before MacCready dragged himself into the central building where the radio tower was set up, exhausted after a day of putting up walls and clearing out a nest of mole rats that had made themselves at home in the field out behind the houses, all after a night of no sleep standing watch.

 

Nate was sitting at the desk, finishing a conversation on the long range radio. He took off the headset when MacCready came in.

 

“There you are. You must be beat.” Nate looked worse for the wear but wired yet. “Have you heard where Cait or Piper went yet?”

 

“Yeah, one of the settlers said Cait’s been up at Abernathy farm, keeping an eye on the situation at Sanctuary from up there. She’s fine.” MacCready sat on the desk beside him. “And Piper got back to Diamond City fine. She said to say she’s sorry she’s not here, but she’ll be back when she can.” He gently nudged Nate’s arm. “Get anything else figured out today?”

 

“I think so. Preston has what Minutemen he has trained coming. Most are at the Castle with Ronnie, but lots are scattered across the settlements. We’re gonna do this, RJ.” Nate looked up at him, and MacCready was struck by how young and determined he looked right then.

 

“I know we are.” He told him. “We’re gonna get Sanctuary back.”

 

“And hopefully set back the Gunners in a bad way.” Nate confirmed. “Do you think Vandal actually is a Gunner, or is she a rogue agent now?”

 

“Hard to say. They likely claim all her work as their own, but how much control over her they have,” he shrugged. “I don’t think they really care anyway.”

 

“Ugh.” Nate slumped in his chair. “It would be way more satisfying knowing we’re taking down a favourite general or something.”

 

“Could still be the case. We don’t know.”

 

“Maybe I could find out.” Nate reached for the radio with renewed interest and started fiddling with the dials. “I’m gonna listen in on Gunner radio for a while and see what I can find out.”

 

“You do that.” MacCready yawned. “I’m going to bed. Don’t stay up too late.”

 

“Yep.” Nate was already absorbed in whatever he had tuned into, but MacCready stumbled off to find a bed or sleeping bag to fall into for the night.

 

***

 

MacCready woke up in the morning with Nate warm on his back, but they couldn’t stay that way long. Nate and Preston had too much to do as they planned and coordinated the troops, and the settlers kept MacCready busy in a variety of ways, although he noticed the Sanctuary settlers usually gave him the good or easy jobs. Most of the next two days was filled with patrolling and cleaning out infestations of various pests, although he pitched in with building a few shacks here and there.

 

At the end of the two days, Nate and Preston were ready to put their plan into action.

 

“We’re going tonight.” Nate told MacCready in the afternoon as they were eating a late lunch. “We’re ready.”

 

MacCready eyed him over his bowl of noodles. They were in one of the cabins, somehow having found a moment of peace. “Only if you take a nap first.”

 

“I’m fine.”

 

“You haven’t come to bed until late, or should I say early, and you’re gone before I even wake up in the morning. You need to sleep.” MacCready insisted.

 

Nate scrunched up his face like a petulant toddler, but MacCready finished off his bowl of noodles before standing and dragging Nate to his feet.

 

“C’mon, I could probably find a way to tire you out enough to sleep.” MacCready invited with a smirk. “Might be our last chance, with a suicide mission and all that.”

 

“That was really working for me right up ‘til the end.” Nate pouted. “You really think our odds are that bad?”

 

“Nah. You got me, haven’t you?”

 

Nate kissed him, tasting like the Quantum Nuka Cola he had just finished. “That I do. I don’t think Vandal stands a chance.”

 

MacCready tugged him closer as he nudged the door shut with his foot and they were able to forget about some of their problems for at least a little while.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tune in next time for _taking back Sanctuary_ which will be sung in the key of _Nate can't catch a freaking break_.


	3. Chapter 3

It was well after dark when Nate and MacCready crept through the tall grass and bushes, slinking closer to Sanctuary. The street lights were on and a few Gunners were on patrol, but they were obviously not expecting any trouble.

 

Nate caught MacCready’s wrist for a moment to make sure that he was following and lead the way around to the north end of town, going along the creek before climbing up the embankment to lay on their stomachs and assess the situation some more.

 

“Doesn’t look like they’ve found the bunker.” Nate whispered to MacCready, indicating the intact locks on the cellar door.

 

MacCready breathed a sigh of relief and whispered back, “no fighting Gunners with a Fatman and near limitless mini nukes, that’s good.”

 

“Let’s wait until that patrol reaches the corner, then I’ll let us in.”

 

They waited until the coast was clear before silently making their way to the back of the house where the bunker was. It was dark in that corner, but MacCready still felt antsy.

 

“Something doesn’t feel right.” He muttered to Nate, shifting his grip on his borrowed sniper rifle. He couldn’t wait to have his own back.

 

“Relax.” Nate said tensely, jamming his key into the first lock and unclipping it. “We’re almost there.”

 

He unlocked the second lock and lifted the jamb, and MacCready heard a soft clink on the concrete inside.

 

“Shit.” Nate swore. “Get d—”

 

MacCready never saw what hit him, but it laid him out flat on the ground and left him with ringing ears and blurred vision. Something heavy was on him, and he eventually realized that Nate had somehow thrown himself in front of him and was now sprawled on top of him.

 

Rough hands grabbed them and dragged them up and into Sanctuary and to the main house, where Vandal was already waiting with a room full of heavily armed Gunners, although he didn’t see anyone with power armour or a Fatman. MacCready was shoved to his knees, but Nate fell onto his side, bloodied hands uselessly clutching at sharp bits of shrapnel from the bunker door that had exploded open and was now buried high in his belly.

 

 _No, no, no_ , MacCready panicked, _this is not how this was supposed to go_.

 

Nate looked down at the damage to his stomach and his shaking hands, then up at MacCready with wide eyes.

 

“S-sorry,” Nate stammered out, clearly going into shock already, “I’m sorry, I sh-should’ve—”

 

“Should’ve stayed away?” Vandal interrupted. “I think so too. And look what you’ve brought me: a ghost in the flesh. I thought I killed you once already.”

 

“What can I say?” MacCready tried to keep his tone light as his mind raced, trying to come up with a plan to get them both out of there. “You’re a terrible shot.”

 

Vandal stalked over to him and grabbed him by the throat, her fingers digging in painfully and cutting off his air. He instinctively clutched at her forearm, but she ignored him while she tore the collar of his shirt to expose the faint scarring on his chest.

 

“Doesn’t look like I missed. But I see that I underestimated the Sole Survivor and his ability to survive, and apparently to help others survive. It is what he’s famous for, after all.” Vandal shoved him to the floor again and he sucked in a huge breath, lungs on the edge of starving for oxygen. “I’ll make sure to hit something that you can’t come back from, this time.”

 

“We-we’ve got you s-surrounded.” Nate rasped from the floor. Vandal laughed.

 

“By who? Your Minutemen? Excuse me if that doesn’t leave me shaking in my boots. They haven’t posed a challenge yet.” She gestured with her head to the Gunner guards. “Take them outside, I don’t want to stain the floor with any more of their blood. And make sure everyone is still on high alert; if the Minutemen do make an appearance I want them dealt with quickly.”

 

MacCready and Nate were dragged back outside and thrown onto the grassy hillside where they had all stood only days before. MacCready found himself kneeling by a dark stain that could only be his own dried blood from when Vandal had shot him, and he had to drag his gaze away from it. Nate managed to stay on his knees, but he was hunched over and hyperventilating.

 

“Nate—” MacCready reached for him without thinking and got a rifle butt to the kidney for it, sending him face first into the grass. 

 

“N-no—” Nate panted, but it didn’t look like he could move from where he was, trembling with pain and weakness.

 

“I’m okay.” MacCready wheezed from down in the dirt, but it took him longer than he liked to get his breath back and get back up on his knees.

 

“I told you before I was bored, ‘Sole’, and I have to say that I’m disappointed. I expected more from you, after all the stories I heard.” Vandal pulled her .44 from her holster and hefted it. “I was thinking about keeping you and playing with you, but those injuries are pretty nasty. I’m not interested in wasting time and resources digging out that metal and treating internal injuries, and I already have my caps and settlement from you, so the road ends here, for both of you.”

 

Floodlights suddenly snapped on from across the river and from up the hill, flooding the entire area in white light. MacCready flinched and squinted in the blinding light, as did everyone else.

 

“That- that timing really could not have been better.” Nate said woozily as MacCready heard vertibirds in the distance and battle cries much closer.

 

“What did you do, Nate?” MacCready asked incredulously.

 

“I told you about this.”

 

“You definitely did not.”

 

“What? Sure I did.”

 

The vertibirds were overhead now, lending their spotlights to the scene. MacCready could make out the Brotherhood emblem on the three aircraft now, and he could see powersuits fighting alongside the Minutemen and a few others that looked like civilians but fought like Railroaders. He recognized Piper, Nick, Cait, and Preston for sure, and he didn’t doubt that others from Nate’s tags-along were there as well. He was itching to leap into the fight, but Vandal’s guard must have sensed it because he felt a cold barrel against the back of his neck.

 

“Give it up, Vandal.” Nate gritted out. “I told you we’ve got you surrounded.”

 

Vandal tore her gaze from the fighting to stare at Nate, her face etched with fury. She suddenly strode towards them, and MacCready was ready to throw himself at her to keep her off of Nate, but she grabbed MacCready instead and held him close in front of her as a human shield with her pistol against his ribs.

 

“Vandal!” Nate somehow found enough breath to yell.

 

“You aren’t playing nice, ‘Sole’, so I won’t either.” Vandal snarled.

 

“You’re the one that was just complaining about being disappointed. Geez, make up your mind.” MacCready snarked and then gasped when she jabbed the gun, hard, into his ribs.

 

“Haven’t you heard? Everyone wants me on their team at the moment, so I radioed around and asked how badly they want me, and also asked how much they knew about a certain Vandal from the Gunners.” Nate said conversationally, breathlessly. MacCready felt Vandal go tense behind him. “Turns out they know a fair bit. You’ve caused a lot of problems for a lot of people, Vandal. You’ve even pissed off the Brotherhood _and_ Railroad enough that they were willing to come take care of this? That takes work.”

 

Vandal laughed again, but it was bitter and hollow this time. “I’m starting to see now, ‘Sole’. Don’t sell yourself short. They aren’t here just for me.”

 

“Dang right they aren’t.” MacCready snarled, and stomped her foot while simultaneously head butting her and shoving back. Her gun went off and it felt like he got kicked hard in his lower back, but he knocked her off her feet and they went over backwards. He scrambled off of her and slapped her pistol away and towards Nate before she could grab it again, but she grabbed him instead and shoved him onto the ground to sit on his stomach and wrap her large hands around his throat and start strangling him.

 

He couldn’t even reach her face to scratch her with his fingernails as he scrabbled, her arms were so long, and all he could do was beat wildly at her armoured forearms.

 

“Vandal!” Nate still sounded winded. “Let me guess: it was the second gate with the third and hardest lock that stopped you from actually getting my shit in my bunker, right?”

 

Vandal snarled in fury but ignored him, intent on finishing off MacCready. He was already starting to black out, the edges of his vision going grey and his ears roaring. But a single shot suddenly rang out, and a red bullet hole appeared near Vandal’s temple. Eyes blank, she slowly toppled off of MacCready, and he pried her loosening grip off his throat to cough and choke and suck in some much needed air.

 

Nate held Vandal’s pistol in shaking hands, but it soon slipped from his grasp and he fell onto his side. MacCready rolled onto his front and tried to get up, but what he figured had to be the rifle butt to his kidney earlier suddenly roared to life and made it impossible to rise and he ended up crawling to Nate’s side. The fighting all around them was getting closer but seemed to be dying down, and he was satisfied to see that it wasn’t the Gunners that were winning. 

 

“RJ,” Nate was shivering in the night air when he reached him, “are you okay? Did I get her?”

 

“‘m okay.” MacCready rasped, his throat aching where she had nearly strangled him. He dragged himself alongside Nate and put an arm over him, trying to share his body heat. He wished he had a Stimpack for Nate, hoped that someone stopped fighting long enough to realize that the star of the show needed help. His own strength was draining, to the point where he didn’t think he could even yell for help if he thought anyone would hear him. “Y’got her.”

 

“She shot you.” Nate reached for him with a shaking hand, and MacCready saw that it had been badly torn up in the explosion earlier.

 

“Yeah, and then the Institute patched me up, remember? Stay with me here.” MacCready wearily closed his eyes but Nate grabbed his shoulder and he opened them again.

 

“No,” Nate insisted, “just now. She shot you _again_.”

 

MacCready frowned, and then remembered the kick to his back when he’d head butted her and her pistol had gone off. He reached and touched his aching lower back, and stared blankly at his crimson coated fingers.

 

“Oh.” He said.

 

“Sh-shit,” Nate was panicking, trying to move but still unable to get up due to his own injuries.

 

“Don’t try to move.” It took massive effort, but MacCready put his arm around Nate again. He was just glad that the cause of all this lay dead only feet away. He could feel himself fading fast, now that the adrenaline was wearing off, and he could see that Nate was too. “Stay with me, Nate. We just- we just have to hang on until someone comes.”

 

A ragged cheer went up in the distance around them, and MacCready dimly realized he hadn’t heard gunfire for at least a few minutes.

 

“General!” Someone was yelling in the distance, clearly looking for Nate. MacCready tried to lift his head, wanting to call out, but it was beyond him at the moment.

 

“Here!” Nate weakly cried. “We’re here!”

 

Everything would be okay, MacCready decided. Help was coming.

 

Cait was suddenly there, roughly shaking his shoulder. “Stay awake, you bastard! You don’t get to do that to us.” She turned to yell over her shoulder. “Deacon, you better tell me you dragged Carrington all the way out here!”

 

Awareness faded in and out, and he only caught bits and pieces of what was happening around him; too fast and confusing for him to understand most of it, and it didn’t take long for everything to spin away into oblivion.

 

***

 

Waking was less jarring but no less confusing. MacCready groggily pried his eyes open and tried to figure out where he was this time. It took a few minutes, but he eventually recognized his and Nate’s room at Sanctuary. Furniture had been moved around, but the posters and signs that Nate had put on the walls were still there.

 

The first person he saw was Piper, sitting beside his bed and flipping through a comic.

 

“I’m gonna go bat shite crazy in here.” Cait said somewhere off to his left.

 

“I think you might already be there.” Piper muttered under her breath.

 

“What was that?”

 

“I said how about you go take a break?” Piper said a little louder, but still whispering. “I’ll keep an eye on them.”

 

There was some clomping as Cait left, and then it was quiet again.

 

“Sorry.” Piper said. “Did she wake you?”

 

“I don’t think so.” MacCready replied, wincing at his dry throat. “I think I woke up before that.”

 

She helped him sit up a bit and drink some water, and he saw Nate sleeping soundly on his side of the bed.

 

“Is he okay?” MacCready asked, surprised that Carrington had allowed them both to be here.

 

“Nate will be fine. He’s already been awake and giving Carrington grief, which is why he’s currently drugged to the gills.”

 

MacCready frowned in confusion, which Piper saw, so she explained.

 

“His hands and arms are in pretty rough shape, to say nothing of his chest, and that kind of delicate stuff needs time to heal. But Nate being Nate wants to be up and about the second he wakes up. So Carrington caught him out of bed one too many times and now…” she gestured towards Nate’s snoring form.

 

MacCready reached across and gently laid his hand on Nate’s arm, careful of bandages. Nate was a warm and real reassurance under his hand, and he felt himself relaxing again.

 

“Did everyone else make it? Did we win? What happened?”

 

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, that is a lot of information for someone who just woke up.” Piper laughed, but she put the comic down. “Long story short, and this is just from what Preston and Cait tells me, Nate radioed Danse, who talked Maxson into sending some guys from the Brotherhood on account of Vandal having somehow killed off one of their patrols last month. And then he radioed Deacon, who somehow convinced his people at the Railroad to send people to help on account that Vandal has been raiding their safe houses for _months_. And amongst all that radioing, word just got around that something big was going down at Sanctuary, so if anyone wanted payback for anything Vandal did it was a good time to show up. So naturally more than a few of our friends showed up, just for kicks.”

 

MacCready shook his head in disbelief, but he really couldn’t expect anything less from the Sole Survivor/General of the Minutemen/the man he had fallen head-over-heels for.

 

“Some people got banged up, but Carrington is taking care of them before he heads out tomorrow.” Piper continued. “Brotherhood went home already, and so has most of the Railroad, but Deacon is still kicking around somewhere. I think everyone is pretty happy with how last night went.”

 

“RJ?” Nate stirred and sleepily mumbled but didn’t open his eyes.

 

“I’m here. Go back to sleep.”

 

Nate subsided again, apparently already dead asleep again.

 

“You should get some more sleep, too.” Piper advised, settling back with her comic again. “You two have had quite the week.”

 

“You can say that again.” MacCready agreed with a ghost of a laugh, hardly able to believe they were all here, and alive. “Nate keeps saying he needs a vacation, but I think it might be time he actually takes one.”

 

“Ha!” Piper slapped her thigh. “Good one, MacCready.”

 

“He never will, will he?”

 

Piper shrugged, flipping another page. “Stranger things have happened.”

 

MacCready looked over at Nate and squeezed his arm ever so slightly.

 

“That they have.” He agreed.

 

***


End file.
